I have just completed the second replacement of the slide valve on my black water tank drain. The reason? The use of the new, marvelous wet wipes that you see advertised so much on the TV. How could that cause a problem you ask? Well it seems as though these things absolutely refuse to decompose or come apart at all in the tank. So one day when you are closing the valve they WILL jam between the valve slider and the closure. This causes the valve not to close all the way. The result? The next time you remove the dump cover you will be surprised with a rush of stinky brown water issuing forth from the dump pipe. Ask me how I know. Come to find out these wonderful wet wipes are causing problems with municipal sewage systems as well. They accumulate in pumps that need to be opened up and cleaned every week or two instead of once a year.

The second thing that has caused problems with the grey water valve and the tank sensor as well was body wash that contains petroleum jelly. The jelly is probably wonderful for your skin but it seems that it unites with something else and forms wax. Yup...WAX. The wax, in turn, collects all the sand in the grey water tank and creates an amalgam that grates and jams the grey water dump valve and plugs up sensors in the Aladdin monitoring system.

So the last couple of days have been spent tearing down the service bay to get to the valves and tank sensors to replace them. Then I got to reconnect everything and hope that it worked OK. Here is hoping that all of the wet wipes in the tank have been flushed out and all the wax is gone from the grey tank and I don't have to go through this again.

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Same goes for hair conditioner. After hearing from a fellow RV'r about how THAT messed up sensors/valves, no more conditioning. My apologies to the owners of our past TT & 5-r as I didn't know that then , but the coach has never had hair conditioner down its tank.

We have been using Baby Wipes, both Huggies, Pampers and now Sam's Club variety, for over 8 years with only one incident where a wipe was caught in the valve when I went to close it. However, I immediately felt the resistance and did NOT force the valve any further.

I filled the black tank with water using the back flush valve and it cleared by the second tank full. Then I filled it one more time just to make sure.

I always use a clear fitting too so I can monitor what's going on.

The reason it happen to me was that the black tank was not completely full when I went to dump the tank, it was only partially full. With the tank full the "whoosh" factor will ensure that everything flows out. Using large amounts of water helps too. When dumping the tank when completely full, I have never had any problems whatsoever.

The only time we don't flush the Baby Wipes is when we are at my brother's place parked next to his barn. To dump the black tank, I use the 42 gallon Blue-Boy and then haul it across the road to his house. Then using the Sani-Con Tank Buddy, the Blue-Boy gets emptied into his spetic system. The Baby Wipes cannot be used with a Sani-Con or the septic system.

My thoughts on this thread: I don't have the time nor do you have the time to sit and read the "Things not to allow in your tanks" if I was to sit and type it all out...........To make this easy(Things not to allow in your tanks)

Whats allowed:1. Poop2. Toilet Paper3. "TON" of water all the time!4. Thats it, refer to #1..........

I read somewhere, perhaps on this site, other than single ply TP if it didn't come out of you, it should not go into the black tank. My DW used to put those butt wipes down the toilet but they never came out with out a great deal of work. Now they go in a trash can by the toilet.